If you are pushing nuclear power by saying renewables are non-starters, Texas would like a word. 40% of our electricity is renewable.
It takes less than a year to build wind or solar farm.
It takes three to six YEARS for nuclear — and the power is more expensive. About triple. That’s insane!
The SPOF are also higher with nukes.
@feloneouscat So, I used to work on wind farms. Wind and solar are both limited by available land. This only works in Texas because we have lots of empty land of low value that has tendency of creating pressure differentials over surface features that are great for wind power. Basically, lots of hills and plateaus.
Wind turbines are also fairly loud. The blade tips are often moving in excess of 100mph. It's like living near a highway.
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@feloneouscat Nuke plants have a drastically smaller footprint and may be a better solution when discussing power for areas like Central Texas where land value and population density are much higher.
There's no one-size-fits-all solution. For many regions, renewables like wind and solar may not be the best fit.
Also worth mentioning, Texas wind farms partly exist because of a buttload of federal subsidies. Thanks Obama!
@FreedomATX @feloneouscat Have you looked into liquid thorium nuc plants? Basically waste from coal plants provides cleaner nuc fuel.
Yes and not impressed. What it all boils down to is nukes are expensive and construction heavy. When you have a LOT of money, you have the potential for corruption (and it does occur with nukes — this isn’t even debatable).
Solar and wind are cheap to build. I’ll let you figure out why Republicans in Texas all of a sudden hate renewables.
We have a LOT OF WIND in Texas. When we were building the horse shelters it would piss me off a lot (moving sheet metal when there are 20 mph gusts is not fun — esp 8-12 feet up).
It’s extremely profitable for ranchers and farmers — the leases can be worth more than what ranchers or farmers make in a bad year.
It’s about the ONLY thing Rick Perry did right as Governor.
@feloneouscat @FreedomATX I never saw as many wind turbines as I did driving (from Colorado) between Lubbock and San Angelo and that was over 10 years ago. Texas is ridiculous. Lots of money always invites, and usually manifests, corruption, yes.